Long Way Back to the River Kwai
A Harrowing True Story of Survival in World War II
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Long Way Back to the River Kwai
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Narrated by:
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Danny Campbell
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By:
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Loet Velmans
About this listen
The astounding memoir of a World War II veteran who spent three and a half years in the slave-labor camps made famous by The Bridge on the River Kwai.
Loet Velmans was 17 when the Germans invaded Holland. He and his family fled to London on the Dutch Coast Guard cutter Seaman’s Hope and then sailed to the Dutch East Indies - now Indonesia - where he joined the Dutch army. In March 1942, the Japanese invaded the archipelago and made prisoners of the Dutch soldiers. For the next three and a half years Velmans and his fellow POWs toiled in slave-labor camps, building a railroad through the dense jungle on the Burmese-Thailand border so the Japanese could invade India. Some 200,000 POWs and slave laborers died building this Death Railway. Velmans, though suffering from malaria, dysentery, malnutrition, and unspeakable mistreatment, never gave up hope. Fifty-seven years later he returned to revisit the place where he should have died and where he had buried his closest friend. From that emotional visit sprung this stunning memoir.
Long Way Back to the River Kwai is a simply told but searing memoir of World War II - a testimonial to one man’s indomitable will to live that will take its place beside the Diary of Ann Frank, Bridge over the River Kwai, and Edith’s Story.
©2003, 2011 Loet Velmans (P)2012 Audible, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
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By: Judith Pearson
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The Escape Artist
- The Man Who Broke Out of Auschwitz to Warn the World
- By: Jonathan Freedland
- Narrated by: Jonathan Freedland
- Length: 11 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 812
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 727
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Story5 out of 5 stars 728
In April 1944, Rudolf Vrba became one of the very first Jews to escape from Auschwitz and make his way to freedom—among only a tiny handful who ever pulled off that near-impossible feat. He did it to reveal the truth of the death camp to the world—and to warn the last Jews of Europe what fate awaited them. Against all odds, Vrba and his fellow escapee, Fred Wetzler, climbed mountains, crossed rivers, and narrowly missed German bullets until they had smuggled out the first full account of Auschwitz the world had ever seen.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Good
- By Matt on 11-10-22
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The Railway Man
- By: Eric Lomax
- Narrated by: Bill Paterson
- Length: 8 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 168
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 155
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 153
A naive young man, a railway enthusiast and radio buff, was caught up in the fall of the British Empire at Singapore in 1942. He was put to work on the 'Railway of Death' - the Japanese line from Thailand to Burma. Exhaustively and brutally tortured by the Japanese for making a crude radio, Lomax was emotionally ruined by his experiences.
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5 out of 5 stars
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From hatred to forgiveness
- By 9S on 05-04-12
By: Eric Lomax
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A Train Near Magdeburg
- A Teacher's Journey into the Holocaust
- By: Matthew Rozell
- Narrated by: Nick Cracknell
- Length: 11 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 177
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 158
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Story5 out of 5 stars 157
From the author of The Things Our Fathers Saw in the World War II eyewitness history series comes this book, offering the true story behind an iconic photograph taken at the liberation of a death train, deep in the heart of Nazi Germany. It's brought to life by the history teacher who discovered it and went on to reunite hundreds of Holocaust survivors with the actual American soldiers who saved them.
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4 out of 5 stars
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important story
- By Amazon Customer on 04-04-20
By: Matthew Rozell
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The Volunteer
- One Man, an Underground Army, and the Secret Mission to Destroy Auschwitz
- By: Jack Fairweather
- Narrated by: David Rintoul
- Length: 9 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 600
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 538
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Story5 out of 5 stars 538
To uncover the fate of the thousands being interred at a mysterious Nazi camp on the border of the Reich, a young Polish resistance fighter named Witold Pilecki volunteered for an audacious mission: intentionally get captured and transported to the new camp to report back on what was going on there. But gathering information was not his only task: he was to execute an attack from inside - where the Germans would least expect it. The name of the camp was Auschwitz.
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4 out of 5 stars
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It is impossible to hear of the atrocities of Auschwitz without being. Forced to consider man’s infinite cruelty
- By Marge Greenwald on 07-15-19
By: Jack Fairweather
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Facing the Mountain
- A True Story of Japanese American Heroes in World War II
- By: Daniel James Brown
- Narrated by: Louis Ozawa
- Length: 17 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 1,354
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 1,203
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Story5 out of 5 stars 1,194
In the days and months after Pearl Harbor, the lives of Japanese Americans across the continent and Hawaii were changed forever. In this unforgettable chronicle of war-time America and the battlefields of Europe, Daniel James Brown portrays the journey of Rudy Tokiwa, Fred Shiosaki, and Kats Miho, who volunteered for the 442nd Regimental Combat Team and were deployed to France, Germany, and Italy, where they were asked to do the near impossible. Brown also tells the story of these soldiers' parents, immigrants who were forced to submit to life in concentration camps on U.S. soil.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Wow
- By Tbone McCoy on 06-13-21
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We Band of Angels
- The Untold Story of the American Women Trapped on Bataan
- By: Elizabeth M. Norman
- Narrated by: Dina Pearlman
- Length: 11 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 490
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 445
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Story5 out of 5 stars 444
We Band of Angelsis the story of women searching for adventure, caught up in the drama and danger of war. On the same day the Japanese Imperial Navy launched its surprise attack on Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, it also struck American bases in the Far East, chief among them the Philippines. That raid led to the first major land battle for America in World War II and, in the end, to the largest defeat and surrender of American forces.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A very moving tribute!
- By mark nelsen on 05-17-17
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No Surrender
- A Father, a Son, and an Extraordinary Act of Heroism That Continues to Live on Today
- By: Christopher Edmonds, Douglas Century
- Narrated by: James Lurie
- Length: 9 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 244
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 220
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Story5 out of 5 stars 219
Part contemporary detective story, part World War II historical narrative, No Surrender is the inspiring true story of Roddie Edmonds, a Knoxville-born enlistee who risked his life during the final days of World War II to save others from murderous Nazis, and the lasting effects his actions had on thousands of lives - then and now.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Personal and impactful
- By Rodney on 10-10-19
By: Christopher Edmonds, and others
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The Nine
- The True Story of a Band of Women Who Survived the Worst of Nazi Germany
- By: Gwen Strauss
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 13 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 392
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 351
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Story5 out of 5 stars 348
The Nine follows the true story of the author’s great aunt Hélène Podliasky, who led a band of nine female resistance fighters as they escaped a German forced labor camp and made a 10-day journey across the front lines of World War II from Germany back to Paris. Drawing on incredible research, this powerful, heart-stopping narrative is a moving tribute to the power of humanity and friendship in the darkest of times.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Soooo good!
- By anne simpson on 09-28-21
By: Gwen Strauss
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Midnight in Broad Daylight
- A Japanese American Family Caught Between Two Worlds
- By: Pamela Rotner Sakamoto
- Narrated by: Emily Woo Zeller
- Length: 11 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 183
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 163
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 162
After their father's death, Harry, Frank, and Pierce Fukuhara - all born and raised in the Pacific Northwest - moved to Hiroshima, their mother's ancestral home. Eager to go back to his own land - America - Harry returned in the late 1930s. Then came Pearl Harbor. Despite being sent to an internment camp, Harry dutifully volunteered to serve his country. Back in Hiroshima, his brothers, Frank and Pierce, became soldiers in the Japanese Imperial Army.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A must listen
- By Jon on 02-01-16
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The Gulag Archipelago, Volume 1
- An Experiment in Literary Investigation
- By: Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn
- Narrated by: Frederick Davidson
- Length: 25 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 1,008
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 871
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Story5 out of 5 stars 867
Volume 1 of the gripping epic masterpiece, Solzhenitsyn's chilling report of his arrest and interrogation, which exposed to the world the vast bureaucracy of secret police that haunted Soviet society. Features a new foreword by Anne Applebaum.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Should be required reading in US schools
- By Richard on 01-01-21
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A Guest of the Reich
- The Story of American Heiress Gertrude Legendre's Dramatic Captivity and Escape from Nazi Germany
- By: Peter Finn
- Narrated by: Rebecca Lowman
- Length: 7 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 57
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 48
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Story4 out of 5 stars 49
Gertrude "Gertie" Legendre was a big-game hunter from a wealthy industrial family who lived a charmed life in Jazz Age America. Her adventurous spirit made her the inspiration for the Broadway play Holiday, which became a film starring Katharine Hepburn. When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, Legendre, by then married and a mother of two, joined the OSS, the wartime spy organization that preceded the CIA.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Fascinating woman in a horrible period in history
- By Marlette on 12-03-19
By: Peter Finn
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The Note Through the Wire
- The Incredible True Story of a Prisoner of War and a Resistance Heroine
- By: Doug Gold
- Narrated by: Conrad Coleby
- Length: 9 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 44
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 40
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 40
In the heart of Nazi-occupied Europe, two people meet fleetingly in a chance encounter. One an underground resistance fighter, a bold young woman determined to vanquish the enemy occupiers; the other a prisoner of war, a man longing to escape the confines of the camp so he can battle again. A crumpled note passes between these two strangers, slipped through the wire of the compound, and sets them on a course that will change their lives forever.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Such devotion
- By smilin29 on 01-01-24
By: Doug Gold
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The Crowded Hour
- Theodore Roosevelt, the Rough Riders, and the Dawn of the American Century
- By: Clay Risen
- Narrated by: Fred Sanders
- Length: 12 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 79
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 69
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 69
The “gripping” (The Washington Post) story of the most famous regiment in American history: the Rough Riders, a motley group of soldiers led by Theodore Roosevelt, whose daring exploits marked the beginning of American imperialism in the 20th century. Both a portrait of these men, few of whom were traditional soldiers, and of the Spanish-American War itself, The Crowded Hour dives deep into the daily lives and struggles of Roosevelt and his regiment. Using diaries, letters, and memoirs, Risen illuminates an influential moment in American history.
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2 out of 5 stars
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Dissapointed
- By Bill on 09-13-19
By: Clay Risen
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The Boy Between Worlds
- A Biography
- By: Annejet van der Zijl, Kristen Gehrman - translator
- Narrated by: Coleen Marlo
- Length: 6 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 252
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 214
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 215
When they fell in love in 1928, Rika and Waldemar could have not been more different. She was a thirty-seven-year-old Dutch-born mother, estranged from her husband. He was her immigrant boarder, not yet twenty, and a wealthy Surinamese descendant of slaves. The child they have together, brown skinned and blue eyed, brings the couple great joy yet raises some eyebrows. Until the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands explodes their promising life. What unfolds is more than the astonishing story of a love that prevailed over convention. It’s also the quest of a young boy.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Should Be Required Reading
- By Pam Pearson on 08-20-19
By: Annejet van der Zijl, and others
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Ivan's War
- Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939-1945
- By: Catherine Merridale
- Narrated by: Derek Perkins
- Length: 16 hrs
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 195
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 164
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 165
Of the 30 million who fought in the eastern front of World War II, 8 million died, driven forward in suicidal charges, shattered by German shells and tanks. They were the men and women of the Red Army, a ragtag mass of soldiers who confronted Europe's most lethal fighting force and by 1945 had defeated it. Sixty years have passed since their epic triumph, but the heart and mind of Ivan - as the ordinary Russian soldier was called-remain a mystery. We know something about how the soldiers died, but nearly nothing about how they lived, how they saw the world, or why they fought.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Bird's eye view of the Eastern Front in WW2.
- By Mike From Mesa on 01-16-20
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The Patient Assassin
- A True Tale of Massacre, Revenge, and India's Quest for Independence
- By: Anita Anand
- Narrated by: Anita Anand
- Length: 10 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 48
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 46
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 46
The “compelling [and] vivid” (The New York Times Book Review) true story of a man who claimed to be a survivor of a 1919 British massacre in India, his elaborate 20-year plan for revenge, and the mix of truth and legend that made him a hero to hundreds of millions.
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4 out of 5 stars
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more interesting history
- By Autodidact on 09-07-19
By: Anita Anand